The evidence:

1. The startups being invested in are designer-led. Take the new Designer Fund that funds startups with designer-founders and helps mentor them. Consider the companies in the banner of their site: YouTube, Tumblr, Android, Slideshare, Feedburner, Flickr, Vimeo, Path, Airbnb…all founded by designers. I think we’ll see this continue to be the case. User experience is a huge differentiator in startups right now, with startups like Typekit, Instagram, Lovely, Oink, and others getting investment and doing well.

2. Hot startups want designer co-founders. I talked with many people who were building startups and their top priority was getting great designers on board. But they didn’t just want good designers. They wanted designer co-founders, people who could help them from day 1 and be invested in the company. This is a change from the ever-present search for technical co-founders…designer co-founders are in demand as well.

This makes sense. In a sea of competition…the survivors will be the ones who can communicate most clearly and provide value most quickly. And who specializes in those things more than designers?

3. Startups are being bought for their design talent. While I was traveling I heard news that Facebook acquired Gowalla and I had to smile. This is an obvious design talent acquisition…Gowalla has one of the most talented groups of designers around and while their service was successful, it was seen to have lost to Foursquare and was looking to reinvent itself. Now, it doesn’t have to…I’m sure Facebook has a large roadmap (apparently they’ll be working on the timeline team) that Josh Williams and company can start designing toward. Couple this with Facebook’s acquisition of Push Pop Press, Sofa, and Daytum, and you see a clear trend here…they’re pulling in as much design talent as they can.

This also jibes with what I heard from other bay-area startups. I’ve talked to friends at both Twitter and Zynga and the message is the same…they are 100% focused on design and investing heavily in it (and have been for a couple years now). I’ve even been asked if I know world-class design teams or agencies who want something new…not because these companies want to work with them but because they want to BUY them…because they can’t get design talent fast enough by recruiting individuals. Seriously.

I also met the design recruiter for Groupon who said that they can’t get enough designers. He was currently fighting against a bit of public pushback b/c of the IPO filing but in general had an amazing growth engine with which to recruit. He could be as aggressive as he wanted in getting designers.

So I’m not sure what the precursor to all of this was…perhaps Apple’s rise to the most valuable tech company in the world on the back of well-designed products? Or maybe the rise of the social networks like Twitter and Facebook who now are poised to be the primary point of communication for the next decade? I don’t know, but those events probably helped. I also think repeated failure of poorly-designed products must be a part of this…we’ve all had those projects in which we knew the design just wasn’t there and hurt over time. I think most people by now have had an experience like this and want to do anything they can to prevent it from happening again.

All of this holds true for us at HubSpot as well…we’re investing heavily in design and front-end engineering for the foreseeable future. We’ve got a ton of projects in the pipeline, and to build the world-class software we want we’re going to need thousands of hours of design work to get there. While our events on the East Coast aren’t quite as big as those in the Valley (yet), our people aren’t lacking in passion for design.

I remember not too many years ago that designers lamented of not having a “seat at the table”. Well, folks, your time has come. Not only do you have a seat at the table…you’ve got a starring role. There is no better time to be a designer than right now.

Apple has had a truly remarkable effect on my life. I have used Apple products for 10 years, since the first iPod came out. A Macbook has been the primary tool I’ve used continuously for over 8 years…that’s every day for 8-12 hours a day for 3,000 days.

So when I sat down and thought about what I would write as a tribute to Steve Jobs, who in my mind is the most brilliant innovator of the modern era, I first thought of his amazing 2005 Stanford Commencement Speech in which he lays out his philosophy on living. In this speech Steve’s life comes into focus, his motivations are exposed, and he looks death in the face. What could I possibly say in a blog post that communicates how I feel about the effect he’s had and continues to have?

But then I remembered a picture I took of my two-year-old daughter that captures just how profoundly Steve changed things. It perfectly embodies Steve’s vision of computing and what Apple is trying to do: change the world for every man, woman, and child. And given that the words “iPad” and “iPhone” are now part of my two-year-old’s everyday language, I would say that though he died much too early at the age of 56, Steve fully succeeded in realizing his vision.

So thank you Steve, and all the people at Apple who do such amazing, life-changing work.

“I have always regarded Apple products – and the kind words Jony Ive has said about me and my work – as a compliment. Without doubt there are few companies in the world that genuinely understand and practise the power of good design in their products and their businesses…

I have always observed that good design can normally only emerge if there is a strong relationship between an entrepreneur and the head of design. At Apple this situation exists – between Steve Jobs and Jony Ive. This was the case at Braun where I always reported to Erwin and Artur Braun or, after their departure, the chairman of the board. It is the same in my relationship with the furniture manufacturer, Vitsoe, where I worked closely with the founder Niels Vitsoe and, since his death, Mark Adams – a period now spanning more than 50 years.

I am always fascinated when I see the latest Apple products. Apple has managed to achieve what I never achieved: using the power of their products to persuade people to queue to buy them. For me, I had to queue to receive food at the end of World War II. That’s quite a change.

I am troubled by the devaluing of the word ‘design’. I find myself now being somewhat embarrassed to be called a designer. In fact I prefer the German term, Gestalt-Ingenieur. Apple and Vitsoe are relatively lone voices treating the discipline of design seriously in all corners of their businesses. They understand that design is not simply an adjective to place in front of a product’s name to somehow artificially enhance its value. Ever fewer people appear to understand that design is a serious profession; and for our future welfare we need more companies to take that profession seriously.

Dieter Rams: Apple has achieved something I never did.

My buddy Jeff Watkins (Jeff is an ajax developer at Apple) and I are planning a web geek meetup Jan. 3 in Newburyport, MA. We know quite a few web geeks in and around town, and the North Shore is teeming with them (you). Every week or so I get wind of someone else who I know of online who happens to live in the area. Unfortunately, North Shorers can be up to an hour+ outside of Boston, so it’s not always easy to get to meetups there. In addition, those folks in Portsmouth are even further…we’ll have done well if we get some Portsmouth folks involved.

So come and meet some other like-minded souls to predict what Apple/Facebook/Google is up to next (isn’t that what web geeks do?) over a pint of beer. And, by the way, Jeff is an loyal employee of Apple…I can’t get even the slightest hint of details out of him.

Details:

Date: Thursday, January 3, 2008
Place: Rosie O’Sheas Irish Pub (see map)
Start: ~6-7pm
Ends: ~10-11pm

Travel tips:

• By Car: Downtown Newburyport is ~3 miles off of Interstate 95, so it’s very easy to find and fast to get into/out of by car. (this ain’t the city)
• Commuter Rail: Newburyport is at the end of the commuter rail…if we have any folks coming on the 5:36 or the 6:15 we’ll do a pick up (the train station is about a mile away from the pub) (commuter rail schedule)

If you have any questions/comments/concerns, feel free to contact me.

View Larger Map

“The second great trend that will soon have an impact on design is social networking. Social media is upending relationships between customers and corporations, brand owners and brand creators, consumers and producers, centralized authority and anarchistic periphery and—pay attention here—designers and their audiences. People want to design their own experiences, or at least have a big voice in it. With Web 2.0 technology and blogs, they get that voice. People are increasingly designing their own shoes and clothes, their own screen pages, their own interfaces, their own homes. And when they’re not, they want designers and managers to really understand what they have to say. Nike is changing the way it designs and manufactures because of social networking. So are dozens of other companies. Yes, we will always have our brilliant geniuses who intuit their audiences and create wonderful experiences for them. Ive and Jobs at Apple. Bang & Olufsen and its incredible designers and designs. But even Apple is getting hit very hard on the sustainability issue because it isn’t listening to its social networks. Brands have ideologies. They stand for things. People believe in those things. When the culture of Apples’ customers changes, as it is happening today, it has to move with it. You, as designers, can’t just do ethnology anymore. You have to join with those you’re observing to be in their culture and create with them.”

Nussbaum sees the audience changing and demanding more because of the software they use and the culture of interaction they’re in. Their expectations are changing because of their experiences with social networking and the closer conversation between companies and customers. In short, Nussbaum sees the realization of the Cluetrain in social networking software.

In addition, and perhaps more interestingly, Nussbaum suggests that companies mine their own social networks for signs of where their businesses should be trending. He doesn’t give any details of how that might happen, though…

I think Nussbaum is right, and he makes a point I’ve heard before, but from a different angle. He points out that designers need to get close to their audience.

But there is one audience that is as close as you can get: developers who design for themselves. It is clear that those designers who design for themselves are more successful than those that don’t. From a user research standpoint this makes perfect sense…those designers don’t have to learn as much about their audience. They don’t have to do interviews, outside user testing, or deep ethnographic research. They’re living the activities they’re building for, so they just build what they need. They are their audience.

I think both viewpoints are right, and complementary. Both the tool makers and the tool users are getting closer to the activity of design. On the one hand, we have more tools than ever to design for ourselves. On the other hand, the social software we’re using everyday suggests we’re increasingly part of the conversation.

But there is also the fact that Design as a topic of discussion is trending upward. It’s on the news. It’s in print. It’s in BusinessWeek, as this piece was. The overall effect is that there are more and more stories of how design is a differentiator…and that in itself also changes expectations. Is it a good thing or a bad thing? I’m not sure, but I do know that talking about design and business in the same breath is more necessary than ever.

Here is a snippet from the Zune site:

Mama always said to share. Now you have an opportunity to do it with music and photos. With wireless Zune to Zune sharing you can send your favorite tracks and photos to friends.

Picture this: You’re walking down the street. Or you’re in a room with a bunch of friends. Or at a concert. Or at the airport. Or on the bus (you get the picture) and then you whip out your Zune and see all these other Zune devices around that you can choose from. Zap! You’re connected to your best friend and send the new song your band recorded in the garage last weekend. Another friend gets the hilarious podcast your kid brother made at school, plus that song you just downloaded from the Zune Marketplace and can’t get out of your head. And hey, lookee here, your friend wants to send you something that you might like and buy, too.

Best of all, the song you sent isn’t just a 30-second preview­—it’s the whole song! Your friend can sample the song up to three times in three days, flag it on their device and then, if they like it, they can buy it later from Zune Marketplace. It’s all connected.

It’s all connected! Wahoo! Doesn’t it sound like my friends are having more fun than me? Their happiness sounds much more important than mine here.

What the Zune folks could be talking about is how their device is personally valuable. In order for anybody to take the Zune seriously after the success of the iPod, the Zune has to be better than the iPod first. It has to be a better personal music player, period. It has to be better at storing and playing my songs for myself. And the online web pages that support the product (an interface mostly comprised of copy) has to reflect that.

Right now the iPod product page continues to do this well. The Zune product page, on the other hand, pales in comparison.

This is a case of the strategy being wrong, and thus the interface communicates the wrong message. (and yes, using the phrase “Welcome to the Social” is how they introduced the Zune if you can believe that). There is no way to communicate the right message if the strategy is wrong! Therefore, everyone involved is set up to fail.

Now, ask any designer and they’ll tell you that design is about communication. But, how effective can designers be if they don’t have any seat the table where the communication is being decided? (see How does Strategy Affect Design?) In the case of the Zune, designers would be able to provide valuable feedback to the strategists about how people actually listen to music, what they value in a music player, and all the other things that design research can discover for you. A quick ethnographic study done by the designers would have shown that music is a very personal activity…we identify ourselves by the music we listen to…and that you must nail that to the ground before you move into the social realm.

Don’t get me wrong here…I love the fact that the Zune folks are interested in and really trying to figure out the social aspects of music. But you can’t jump to that place without figuring out the personal aspects first. As I mentioned the other day a good question to ask here is…”Is this thing useful to someone even if nobody else uses it?”.

Now, it could be that the Zune is a great personal music player (it may be…I don’t know…its entirely unclear). But that’s not being communicated right now. When the Zune is a better personal music player than the iPod then, and only then, can its social features be touted. Right now the designers (and marketers, strategists, etc) are focusing way too much on the social, and not enough on the personal.

1. Aspirations and beliefs (what we are and what we could be)
2. David vs. Goliath (fighting the powerful, common enemy)
3. Avalanche about to roll (excitement about being up with the latest trends)
4. Contrarian/counterintuitive/challenging assumptions (truth to power)
5. Anxieties (our rational…and irrational…fears)
6. Personalities and personal stories (interesting or inspirational people to emulate)
7. How-to stories and advice (practical advice)
8. Glitz and glam (promising to be like those who seem to have it all)
9. Seasonal/event-related (contextually based on what’s happening now)

In application interface design, the most important thing on the screen is the words we use. This list is a good starting point for those struggling to find a framework around which to structure their copy. You can use one or two of these to really solidify your point, knowing that the technique is probably something that people care about.

The place where they might show up in app design is on the pages where action is required and it’s not certain that people are convinced yet. On an account signup page, for example, one could add a short description leveraging “How to Stories” to illustrate how others are using your app with success. That might be just what the person needs to convince them that it is really worth it to sign up for an account.

Note that Apple often relies on “David vs. Goliath” (Apple vs. Microsoft) and Contrarian (Think Different) themes to market their products. They are very consistent in this way.

Even so, my gut tells me that several of these are over-used, however. The “Glitz and Glam” and “Avalanche about to roll” are often used in places where they’re not appropriate. Most web applications aren’t about being glitzy or trendy…they’re about getting things done. There may be places to leverage these in app design, but they are few and far between.

Guy has a nice writeup of these ideas. He even references Steve Job’s 2005 Stanford Commencement Address, one of my favorite speeches of all time. Every time I read it I realize that it’s not just another speech…it’s Jobs’ whole life in a nutshell. We would do well to heed his advice…

Apple has recorded all of this in the iPhone gallery pages on Apple.com. The gallery shows long lines of both happy and exhausted Apple fans, some staying over night to get a chance to purchase the long-awaited iPhone. They also show banks of reporters with huge camera lenses trying to get a perfect shot of the action. And then they show the relief and happiness of the moment of purchase. These people are true fans, and the gallery depicts them as conquering heroes. One almost gets the feeling of religious fervor when looking at all these images.

Furthermore, the blogging world was abuzz with the iPhone. Not only were bloggers writing about the iPhone every day, but some enterprising folks took videos of their experience. Some even showed the event in real-time.

This is social proof at its finest. Social proof is the idea that in situations where we don’t know what course of action to take (should we buy the iPhone?) we tend to watch and rely on the behavior of others to determine our own. When we see hundreds of people in line for something we assume they must be in line for something worth being in line for. The overall effect is that we start thinking the iPhone must be worth it.

This isn’t a new phenomenon…it’s as old as they get. But what is surprising about the iPhone launch is how Apple is using it to its advantage. Apple knew they had tons of iPhones in stock. They knew that you didn’t have to wait in line for days to get one. But they also knew the power of how that waiting in line would affect those who weren’t, and so they were there to record the whole thing. Now, that excitement is part of their site design…right in the gallery.

We can design for social proof in many ways. Amazon shows its most popular items sold. Techmeme shows the most talked about blog entries. The NYTimes shows the most-emailed articles. All of these features don’t explicitly tell us to buy or do the same as others. But that’s the effect they’re having. When we see so many people going out of their way to do something that we may have been wondering about, it surely makes us more likely to do it ourselves.

So the question is: How can you leverage social proof in your design? Is there an event or activity that your readers/customers/fans are doing that you could record or show to others?

Apple has done an amazing job of leveraging social proof, both in the build up to the launch as well as in the recording and sharing of it. It may not be part of the design of the product itself, but it sure is part of the iPhone experience.

The unparalleled success of the Apple iPod is quickly becoming design legend. Not only is the iPod internationally known as the coolest gadget worth stealing, but those in the design community can’t stop talking about it. Not only do I hear the iPod talked about by industrial designers, but all types of designers. Web designers, interior designers…all feel the gravitational pull that seems so easy to transfer to designing other media. They’ll say: “We want a simple, clean design, like the iPod”. Never mind that the iPod is a physical product that plays music, it is widely believed that its magic can be transfered to all disciplines of design, aural or otherwise.

Of course, the situational context that brought the iPod into being will never exist again. Never again will an atmosphere exist like the one in the late 90s. Never again will Apple be able to fly under the radar of the music industry. Never again will huge competitors laugh at Apple for making a small, silly device with rounded corners and a click-wheel.

But that doesn’t stop nearly everyone from using Apple’s success as the ideal example of design done right. If we only look to the iPod for design inspiration, we can come up with the super simple, super sell-able design that everybody craves. There isn’t a Powerpoint presentation in all of the design world without a slide dedicated to the white, beautiful, yet unreplicable, iPod.

The problem is that the iPod in an incredible outlier. It’s not necessarily a one-hit wonder, but it is such a big hit that no other product from any company can expect to perform similarly, not even the iPhone. The iPhone, of course, enjoys some of the best buzz in the world, and it hasn’t even been released yet. But even with the incredible talk surrounding it, there is no way that the iPhone can be as successful as the iPod, as it enters an existing, relatively mature market. The iPod has 70% market share. The iPhone will be lucky to grab 5%.

Not only is the product an outlier, but Apple is unlike any other company. First of all, it is 30 years old, which immediately sets it apart from most companies. It has had all that time to build up the amazing array of designers it has, learn what works and what doesn’t, and invest huge amounts of money into technology that most design firms could only dream of. Imagine what they’ve invented that has never hit the light of day. Even the return of Steve Jobs was a decade ago…an incredibly long time.

The iPod is a great case study, but it’s not replicable by any standard means. Microsoft’s attempt at doing so, the Zune, is hardly a blip on anyone’s radar. And that came from a company who had years and years and more money than anybody to throw at the problem. A better strategy might be to build whatever is the opposite of the iPod. Then, at least, you don’t have impossible expectations.

Less than a decade old, the iPod will endure as one of the best industrial designs ever. It is well-deserved. But as far as showing everyone else the way to design, it does more to blind us than help us see more clearly.

With metadata capabilities built into Mac OS X Tiger, it was only a matter of time before someone started using tags to keep track of their files. The Mac search system, Spotlight, provides ways to attach metadata to files that could help us find them much more easily than searching through our trove of hierarchical folders.

Back in April Nick Santilli wrote this piece at Lifehacker: Metadata as a ‘filing system’, explaining how he used both the built-in Spotlight features as well as the application Quicksilver to create a folksonomy for himself. Here is a snippet:

“I think it took me about 4-6 weeks before I got things ironed out to a point where it became effortless in execution and actually useful to me. Using a metadata filing system as opposed to folders requires a slight shift in the way you think. It’s not difficult, but it is something you have to work at a bit to truly acquire the habit.

For now, get thinking in a metadata frame of mind, because it’s the future of modern operating systems.”

Wow, that’s some serious optimism for the tagging approach.

Nick has now continued his investigation into the matter with this piece: Using Metadata Effectively in OS X

This use of tags is very similar to how people are tagging items online with services like Del.icio.us. There’s a lot going on in this space…and the operating systems are now starting to catch up. Word is that Vista also has a lot of metadata features, but since it only just came out the Mac is where the research is right now.

I haven’t tried this yet, but I’m anxious to see if it works.

(note, read down through the comments in the second piece: people have lots of suggestions for similar/alternative uses)

Or, if like his latest Boing Boing piece: iPhone – the roach motel business model, he disagrees with it on the basis that it is the ultimate “lock-in”.

I ask in all sincerity because “lock-in” isn’t so bad if you like what you have. If, for example, Apple provides a markedly better user experience than other companies, people will buy the iPhone despite nasty DRM and other things.

Since the iPhone was released last week, this issue has come up again and again. Since I’m a Mac user, I’ve been paying close attention. After all, I’m tied-in with my laptop and iPod…I can’t simply choose any peripheral that I want and have it work with my iPod, for example. The content I purchase from the iTunes Store works only on my iPod. Since I have an iPod, its not an issue. If I wanted to use a non-Apple piece of hardware to play my songs and movies, I couldn’t.

What is at issue is mixing hardware and purchased content from various vendors. Cory, I presume, would want to be able to play his iTunes music on windows hardware…wait, he can already do that on his computer. (so let’s use Linux as an example). But it is true that he can’t play it on other mp3 players, unless he exports it using a 3rd party AAC to MP3 app, and that doesn’t seem right.

The counter-argument is that this sort of integration is necessary to have something “just work”, which is the primary and best reason why I used Macs. Ethan Kaplan has a piece: Enough already with the iPhone hand wringing! that represents that argument pretty well.

My guess is that Cory was worried mostly about content lock-in, that music or video files, once purchased, should be playable on all devices. I agree with that. I agree that we shouldn’t have content lock-in. Just as I want to be able to read Word documents on my Mac (with or without Office installed), I want to have access to my purchased iTunes files no matter what hardware I have in the future.

To some extent, however, hardware lock-in almost seems inevitable, given the speed with which innovation happens. I surely don’t want to go through the horrors of Windows hardware compatibility if I can help it. What a nightmare.

But lock-in is good in some cases. I’m completely “locked-in”, so to speak, to my wife and child, and I can’t think of a better position to be in.

The reason why I use the silly analogy of marriage, of course, is that we do have a choice here. We’re choosing to lock ourselves in. Let’s not forget that. And, whenever we howl to the moon about Google and privacy, remember that we don’t have to use the service. That’s the amazing part of this all…that these companies are so good at what they do that we’re willing to sacrifice other points in order to get them. Right now I’m happily in the Apple camp and, frankly, I don’t want to buy hardware from anyone else.

Design is always a balancing act. If, for example, there was no DRM in the downloadable songs we probably wouldn’t have the iTunes store to purchase them from. The studios just wouldn’t agree. If we didn’t have the iTunes music store, we would have to go buy CDs or go to another online music store, which have other restrictions. And, we might be stuck with systems that don’t “just work”.

I’m not trying to justify Apple’s actions here…I’m simply saying that they’ve got a hell of a lot of constraints, not just technical but social and political…and the end result is a balancing act. I’m happy with the way they’ve decided to go, compared with, say, Redmond.

So what’s your take? Are you happy with the idea of a locked down iPhone?

The Bokardoan Boris writes in a comment to my post yesterday:

“The killer app of mobile devices is not voice, it is text communication. And touchscreens are notoriously bad as keyboards. No tactile response. QWERTY is good for when you have all your fingers available, terrible for one-handed thumb use.

Have you run out and gotten your flatpanel keyboard yet? No, you haven’t. ”

This echoes a sentiment seen in lots of places on the Web.

Dan Saffer of Adaptive Path has reservations about a lack of buttons:

“I do have my reservations, however, mostly around, well, buttons. The new device has only one physical button, and while the simplicity and flexibility of having one/no buttons and only using “soft” digital buttons is nice, I wonder how well that will work over time. As others have pointed out, “non-mechanical buttons actually reduce the user experience rather than enhance it. Often because…static buttons are not used in a correct context and [they] lack two important things: tactile and haptic feedback.” I wonder if the iPhone will attempt to compensate for this, much like the Wii’s controller slightly vibrates when you roll over a button. Without buttons, it’s really just a smooth slab of plastic.”

Similarly, Jason Fried of 37signals wonders how it changes the way he uses phones:

“How can you dial the iPhone without looking at it? How can you reach in your pocket and press “1” for voicemail? How can you orient yourself with the interface without seeing it? With a traditional phone or device with buttons you can feel your way around it. You can find the bumps, the humps, the cut lines, the shapes, the sizes. You can find your way around in the dark. Not with the iPhone.”

These are great discussions to have. We all knew that buttons were an issue, but now that Apple went the complete other way we’re having some reconsiderations.

What’s your take? Do you think you’ll like the button-less interface or do you prefer buttons?

However, I think the most important thing Steve said, and the one thing that is most important to the iPhone, is this:

“The killer app (on mobile phones) is making calls”.

This, to me, is the essence of design. Focus on the problem, often a single human activity, and with every decision you make acknowledge, push, and honor it. Add features, yes, but add them only as a peripheral, never to get in the way of, solving the single problem.

That, to me, is what sets Apple, and all great designers, apart.

First off, Apple is making a huge social software push. This is indicated not only in the up and coming MacWorld rumors, but in their already-released details of the next release of OS X: Leopard. If you’re not familiar with Leopard’s new social features, check out: Apple Making a Huge Social Software Push?

iPhone

The iPhone is the most active and exciting rumor of this year’s Macworld. But it has long been rumored, and never released. Why?

Apple just hasn’t got to the point where they feel they can enable a great experience yet. There are too many uncontrolled variables: carrier technology, calling plans, area coverage, 1 and 2-year contracts, compatibility between carriers, rapidly-changing functionality like camera and music, IP-based telephony, and seamless synchronization between handset, computer, and software (and probably many more). Imagine having to work with monopoly-hungry companies like the telecoms while trying to beat them at the same time! Apple’s “it just works” ideal is a hard fit here.

So what could Apple bring to the mobile phone game?

Many people are excited to think of a phone experience that is as seamless as the music experience enabled by iTunes and the iPod. That’s why I’m excited. Apple has raised our expectations to a really high level here. These expectations include a handset from the Gods: super simple, elegant, and a stylish exterior. More importantly, these expectations include software that is easy to use and “just works”.

But Apple, being a computer company, has more flexibility because it has access to other parts of people’s computing experience than do telecoms. More concretely, if Apple recorded (not necessarily the audio, but the metadata of the call) all the calls we make and store that information in our .Mac account (assuming you’re still subscribed, of course), then lots of other things become possible. You could phone-to-text message, much like is happening at Twittr (not that this is the ideal model, but recording text messages on a web page in a similar way). You could look at call histories, giving a clear picture of our calling habits, how many minutes we’ve used up, and who we’re talking to. You could have chat and blogging built in, as is happening with Leopard to some extent already (see the piece I linked to at the start).

All of this would lead to a “phone profile”, much like a social-networking profile, where we could connect with our friends to do *any* sort of messaging we want. Voice, voice-text, web-text, chat…all in one central location. Of course, to make this valuable to people you would need a way to fill out the profile with personal information so that it replicates offline identity online, having contacts/friends only a link away, giving people motivation to represent themselves with accuracy. This could potentially become the single hub around which we communicate with others. All built around the iPhone, which handles both voice, text and possibly, video messaging. Another way to look at this is to imagine the iPhone as just a device to message with, including but not limited to voice. The big difference being that all of our messages, no matter what form they’re in, where there were sent from, how they were sent, are all located in one, easy to access, place.

Now, I’m glossing over many other super important things that the iPhone has to do right to be a success. Things like seamless integration between Address Book, iCal, iChat, and Mail. All these things need to work together, recognize who are our friends and who aren’t, and make it painless to contact people in one of many different ways, save information and add contacts effortlessly.

iTunes

At some point in the not-so-distant future, the iTunes player and music store will have serious competition, as Microsoft and other competitors figure out successful formulas for selling music online. iTunes, as it currently exists, lacks social features that it desperately needs to face its future competition. Apple doesn’t need to look very far for inspiration: music recommendation engines Last.fm and Pandora both have lots of wonderful social features that help people discover new music. And, for those movically inclined, Netflix kicks a lot of butt in the movie recommendations area. (an Apple/Netflix partnership of some sort would be intriguing).

iTunes currently gives good insight into what’s popular. Users can easily find out what most people are listening to and/or watching. But artistic tastes vary widely, and what’s popular on iTunes is usually what’s hip among the largest group of music and movie buyers: teens and 20-somethings. For people with a more, er, longer view, the popular list isn’t very helpful at all. Instead, they’re more likely to turn to iTunes “related” feature, which suggests other bands and movies based on the one you’re currently looking at.

(added) In addition, iTunes allows for music sharing on local networks. Users can view and play music of folks who are on the same network as them.

What people can’t find out, and what is crucial to music and movie sharing, is knowing what your trusted social groups are listening and watching. iTunes lacks a way for people to know what their friends and family are currently enjoying. This is where most of our recommendations come from. iTunes could benefit greatly from a recommendation service based not only on what people listen to and watch, but also what trusted people are doing.

An integral part of this is to have a representation of friends built into iTunes. Also, you would need a way to scrobble what you’re playing/watching to your iTunes account. Apple sort of does this, of course, with their mini-store, but it’s turned off by default (more here). In addition, it has to add more value than a mini-store, which only tries to sell you more stuff. More importantly, it has to have messaging that says that Apple isn’t using your data for nefarious purposes.

Podcasting

Apple has made significant improvements to pod and video casting over the last couple iterations of its iLife and Quicktime software. The time has come, however, for the process to be painless. Recording podcasts in Garageband is too difficult, with multiple steps needed to record and produce. It should be very little more than a two-step “record, publish” process.

Secondly, Apple has so far pushed podcasts as something akin to radio broadcasts. The podcasting tutorial gives great insight into how to do just that: create an extended, informative show with an intro, an outro, segments, music, etc. But I wonder, isn’t podcasting more than just replicating the radio experience? I know that some of the most compelling audio I’ve heard is just someone talking about something interesting, telling a story, or explaining something difficult. I don’t really care about the “show” as much as the content of a particular episode. Though podcasts grew from the subscription model, it doesn’t mean that everyone needs to have a regular, half-hour show that we listen to on a regular basis. If people have time to produce such a thing, then great! But most of us, even if we went through that process once, have little time to do it right for an extended period of time.

I think podcasting will really take off when it becomes smaller, more discrete, and more social. When we can subscribe to our friend’s podcast and listen to their two-minute message today, not just some deeply-engaging half hour show. This gets back to the messaging idea with iPhone. Messaging doesn’t need to be structured or high-fidelity. There’s a lower-fidelity sweet spot with podcasting…just as there was with YouTube and video.

Wrapup

Well, if I spent any more time writing this Macworld would have been over before I got it published. As such, I didn’t even get to lots of ideas I have about iTV, iWeb, and the other iLife apps, not to mention Leopard Server!. Oh well. If you have any ideas about Apple’s social leanings, let me know in the comments…

I’m a huge fan of U2. I’ve listened to them since I was a sophomore in high school, when I purchased the Achtung Baby album after hearing One and Mysterious Ways on the radio. I love that album as much as any album in the pantheon of music. It means so much to me because it was the album that essentially got me through high school, and as corny as that sounds you know what I’m talking about.

Now I have nearly every one of their albums, with the exception of a couple early ones. (I think they hit their groove with War and have been kicking butt ever since). Anyway, I own all of their songs from that album on that have been released on albums. I dutifully purchased each CD, lovingly took care of them, and can’t say that about any other band. I’m a U2 guy, through and through.

When iTunes came out, I burned all of my CDs onto my computer and now happily use that as my jukebox. I currently have 17 albums in my iTunes U2 library, including an audio copy of the Live in Sydney video that is one of the best concerts ever, performed the day after Adam Clayton almost quit the band (probably the best version of One ever, if you like that song). So, as you can see, I have a lot of U2 music.

Recently, iTunes released a new U2 album called U218, made up of 18 greatest hits…well…15 greatest hits plus three new tracks. These three new tracks are the ones that I want(of course), but guess what? You can’t get the three new ones without buying the entire album. Even worse, you can easily purchase the other songs ala carte, one by one, if you want to. Not so with the new songs.

This sucks. I’ve been a U2 fan for over 10 years, legally own all their music, and now I have to re-purchase an entire album of songs I already own just to get three new songs? That’s wrong, just plain wrong, and it’s as plain as day to see.

I’m not the only one feeling the pain. Here’s a couple comments from the U218 album page:

“Finally have the opportunity to get the only song off this album I actually want – The Saints are Coming – and it’s a freaking Album Only thing! What the hell? I’m not going to spend $20 for 17 songs that I don’t want just to get the one song I do want. Come on iTunes, sell it as an individual song!”

And another:

“It really irritates me that I have to buy the whole album in order to get three new songs. Any true U2 fan should already have all these songs. Really don’t care if I sound cheap but give me a break. Quit playing games and release the three new songs so I can buy them”

I don’t know how widespread this problem is on iTunes, but I have seen several other cases of it. Part of me wants to complain to Apple, and part of me thinks it’s probably not them…it’s probably the music industry bigwigs. I’m confident to say that from what I know about Steve Jobs, he would rather give true music fans the ability to purchase only those songs they don’t own rather than have to keep buying the ones they already own over and over again. With his efforts to keep the pricing scheme easy and fair for people, he’s proven that he’s on our side…I hope.

So what can we do? Well, if you’re experiencing the “Album-Only” pain, too, let’s join together, get this message out on the blogs, and see real change happen. So, instead of commenting below (which is OK, of course), go spread the message through your blog. If we’re loud enough we can get change to happen!

Because I want some new U2 for Christmas…baby, please come home.